GameSessions Blog

The Cheapest Gaming PC Challenge: Part 1

With all this talk of Steam Boxes and living room PCs, we decided it was time to give the in-house team a good challenge. After listening to them all talking about hardware and who’d make a better PC, it soon became obvious that there was only one way to find out…The Cheapest Gaming PC Challenge!

Objective: To build the cheapest possible gaming PC suitable for your living room.

We had to set a few rules to make it fair, although it seems that one of our devs has already been picking at them to find loopholes!

Minimum specs:

Must play the the most demanding GameSessions trials at 720p resolution and at a minimum of 30 fps:

Rules for the Cheapest Gaming PC Challenge:

– Must have wifi.
– Build cost will be calculated as what the team spent on all components in the build, including VAT.
– All components must be purchased new.
– No keyboard, mouse or controller need be included.
– No allowance is needed for the cost of Windows.
– Must include a power supply.
– If a tiebreaker is required, the PC that weighs the least (including power supply) will be the winner.

WiFi on motherboards is rare, so a thumbnail sized WiFi USB dongle would have to do the job. I got my last one for < £5 on EBay, but they are so cheap we'd be nitpicking. Anyway, gaming is best done over Ethernet.